
1 minute read
2012 2012 2012 2012 2012
We Give a Home to 60 Stray and Abandoned Horses and Ponies and Save 20 from Flooding and Neglect...

A horse crisis spread across the country and, rather than being asked to take in one or two horses at a time, we began to take in whole herds.
In one case, we received an urgent call from a Trading Standards Officer which resulted in Hillside giving sanctuary to a herd of sixty stray and abandoned horses and ponies from South Wales. We couldn’t refuse to help these homeless horses who had nowhere else to go. They had been impounded by the council after they were found straying on housing estates, school grounds and busy roads where they were in danger of being hit by traffic.
We were also asked to help another herd of horses, including pregnant mares and foals, who had been abandoned on wasteland that had flooded and were only being fed by kind members of the public who had taken pity on them. When their field flooded they became trapped on a railway embankment and, to keep them from starving, fire crews launched dinghies and transported hay to them across the deep water.
...our traumatic investigation at the Red Lion Abbatoir uncovered systemic and ongoing horse abuse at the UK’s then largest horse slaughterhouse. The sheer number of unwanted horses that ended up in those dark, cramped pens, only to be cruelly treated as they were killed, shocked us deeply. Our disturbing footage, which was widely broadcast on TV and in the national press, showed several breaches of animal welfare regulations including...

Horses routinely crammed two and even three at a time to be shot on top of one another. Animals left to suffer with horrendous injuries and disease.
Horses not being stunned correctly, needing to be shot again and...
...often regaining consciousness before having their throats cut.
Horses beaten with ropes and iron bars.
We hope that our shocking findings will make everybody who ‘uses’ or breeds horses, aware that their actions have consequences for innocent animals that are depending on them to be kind and compassionate, lest they should meet their end in such a dreadful place.
90 Cows Rescued...
In March 2013, GlamorganTrading Standards requested our urgent help. They were planning to seize a large herd of ex-dairy cows and calves who were suffering extreme neglect. Around 40 were so emaciated that they had already died or had to be euthanised on welfare grounds. In the short time a rescue could be organised, a further 20 had perished or were just too weak to make the journey to safety. Their owners have now been successfully prosecuted for neglecting them.
We brought the surviving 90 cows and calves back to Hillside to give them a safe home after all the suffering they had been through.
